The man who stabbed South Korea’s opposition leader in the neck in January, the worst assault on a politician in the country in nearly two decades, was sentenced on Friday to 15 years in prison.
A judge in Busan, the port city where the attack happened, found the man guilty of attempted murder and violating election laws. The defendant — Kim Jin-seong, a real estate agent, who was identified by the authorities only as Mr. Kim — has a week to appeal the sentence and the conviction, a spokesman for the court said.
The Jan. 2 knife attack left Lee Jae-myung, who was then the leader of South Korea’s main opposition party, bleeding from his jugular vein and sent him to an intensive care unit. He was discharged after eight days. Mr. Lee was attacked while making his way through a crowd after touring the site of a planned airport.
The police said Mr. Kim, who was born in 1957 and lived in Asan, a city south of Seoul, had planned the attack for months and had stalked Mr. Lee at previous rallies. They said Mr. Kim, who had written an eight-page manifesto, wanted to ensure that Mr. Lee never became president.
